


A Very Careful Kindness

by Diomedes



Category: Civil War II (comics), Iron Man (Comics), Marvel 616
Genre: Civil War II, Doom tires to help, M/M, Tony Stark Has Issues, Tony Stark Needs a Hug, but like a manipulative tyrant would
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-12-15
Updated: 2018-12-15
Packaged: 2019-09-17 03:13:22
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 7,982
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16966602
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Diomedes/pseuds/Diomedes
Summary: Tony hates Doom because Victor is a self-made man and Tony is in the process of being unmade. He has lost Rhodey and Bruce to the stunted visions of a college kid. He has lost Amara and Pepper for his selfishness. He’s lost his material possessions, Stark Tower and 84 personnel to the Inhumans for his hubris. He will lose SI in kamikaze revenge on a father he hated and loved in unequal measures. His sobriety is up for grabs and he is well on his way to losing his life in a showdown with Carol.“What do you want?” Tony asks. Maybe Doom will finally give him an answer once he realizes that by the end of all this there will be nothing of Tony left.





	A Very Careful Kindness

**Author's Note:**

> Follows after Civil War #6, Captain America: Steve Rogers #6 and Invincible Iron Man #13 (I have no idea which one is chronologically last).

Tony likes to think if Steve had said _No, you’re wrong, drop it_ he would have but he suspects they both know better. Still, Steve’s endorsement swings the Illuminati meeting in Tony’s favour and he’s ridiculously grateful to be standing beside Cap instead of opposite him because that might mean that _this time_ won’t end up like _last time_. Tony doesn’t know how he survived _last time_.  
  
There’s a fairly good argument to be made that he didn’t.  
  
So he’ll take Steve’s support anyway he can get it even if that means a complete rehash of all Tony’s past mistakes and current flaws. Cap had been cold during their conversation on the balcony - borderline vicious, even - but he’s the same old Steve to everyone else. Tony doesn’t deserve to feel this blindsided. He’s hardly innocent after all. He’s _guilty as sin_. There’s nothing wrong with Captain America just because he finally got with the program.  
  
This is just what they are now. (For the time being, until everything crumbles.)  
  
The conversation still gnaws at him seven hours later even as his eyes burn from lack of sleep. He has another eleven hours to kill before the plan kicks into motion. The world is waiting to see what Iron Man does now that it’s Captain America’s life in the balance and either Ulysses is proven wrong or Tony has just arranged Steve Rogers’s death for a second time -    
  
That won’t happen. He’ll make sure it won’t.  
  
( _He can hear Rhodey and Bruce laughing offstage_.)  
  
His temples throb, he needs sleep. Which is to say now is not the optimal time for Doom to teleport into Tony’s workshop like they have an open door policy. Victor just walks out of the shimmering portal of magic and into Tony’s line of vision looking like he always does: untouched and regal, like he is so above it all while Tony is quite literally buried under a metric tonnage of destruction bearing his name.  
  
The worst part is that Doom has the audacity to look like the world isn’t ending. And he’s right - it isn’t; that’s just Tony’s ego talking. The world is fine; it’s Tony who’s unravelling in ribbons, standing clumsily as he’s pared down to his core, unsure of what will be left.  
  
Scratch the above - _that’s_ the worst part: that Doom acts like he already knows. That he might recognize the hungry black hole housed between Tony’s ribs that he keeps buried under the artificial glow of his manmade heart. That they might share it in common.  
  
“After your show of force at the Triskelion yesterday I expected you’d have finished wallowing.” Doom’s voice is easy and casual. Like they’re friends instead of enemies, though the lines these days are blurred.  
  
“Stop pretending you know me then.”  
  
“I know you quite a bit better than most.”  
  
Doom walks over to inspect an array of Iron Man armours, running his hands over them. The action leaves Tony feeling vaguely defiled. He called this lab his church once and a cynic would say it’s as close to religious worship as he could ever get: straight up idolatry, the absolute veneration of empty shells of himself. A church with a congregation of one. Faith in Tony Stark is a lonely endeavour these days.  
  
He tears his gaze away as spots dance in his vision. “Everyone always thinks they do. But last time I checked we’re not friends.”    
  
“I was God once.”  
  
“That explains quite a bit about the world, actually.”  
  
Doom finally walks back towards where Tony is sitting. “It was an exercise in absolute power and… restraint. I wonder what the world would think of you if they understood how much of your life is devoted to the concept.”  
  
Tony snorts.  
  
“I’m sure they wouldn’t want to meet you without it.” Doom’s lips twitch and Tony is struck by how expressive his face can be without the omnipresent mask. “Imagine what you could accomplish: wealth and taste wrapped around the threat of force. An infinite arsenal focussed through a single point. You could bend them to your will if you so desired,” Tony imagines nostalgic longing creeping into Doom’s voice, “but you don’t. It’s what makes you a superhero. Restraint.”  
  
It’s inappropriate to laugh but Tony does it anyway. Cackles really, because _god, no_ , it has nothing to do with restraint and everything to do with the parts of Tony that are missing. The world as it exits isn’t for Tony’s lack of trying, but for lack of execution. He isn’t losing because he’s reduced himself to playing by the rules, he’s losing because Tony Stark is not that small of a target to hit, to hurt, to prove wrong and unbalance.  
  
It’s not restraint. It’s failure. He’s failed as a futurist, as a superhero, as a friend, and Doom has come to praise him for it.  
  
“You are never going to be a hero,” Tony rasps and the raw ugliness in his voice must finally strike a chord because Doom’s lips draw into a scowl.  
  
“It’s fascinating that you find the idea of predictive justice so horrible while having absolute faith in your own vision of the future.”  
  
Tony grits his teeth. “ _I_ am not the law.”  
  
“No. You are a scientist. One would think you’d take advantage of the new tool available to you.”  
  
“So I can arrest people for things they haven’t done yet? Haven’t even started?” Tony’s fingers unconsciously skitter over the unfinished project on his workbench. “Thought crimes scare me.”  
  
Doom grabs his wrist before Tony’s shaking hands can more damage. “Because your mind creates terrible things. Idly. Impulsively,” Doom says, dark eyes boring into Tony’s like he knows. “You destroy the world a thousand times a day in your head and _Before_ no one knew how easily you could. You’re afraid the Inhuman Child will tell everyone that one day those idle thoughts escape into reality. A futurist afraid of his own future." He scoffs. “The world should be grateful everyday for your mercy.”    
  
Tony yanks his hand away. “You’re not psychic, stop pretending to be. Thoughts don’t necessarily become actions.”  
  
“They do not,” Doom says easily. “ _Restraint_.”  
  
Tony drives his palms into his eye sockets until he can’t see arsenals or dead bodies or Rhodey. Victor has retreated to inspect the pictures on the wall: The Avengers in front of the Mansion, the Tower, accepting medals from the President. The _Good_ Ironman has been party to.  
  
Tony was a superhero. Might still be, depending on your point of view and on what you make of redemption. Tony has to believe in it, for his own sake. He just can’t let himself believe in Victor von Doom and how unfair is that? Maybe Tony is just the prototype, the cautionary tale. How not to be.  
  
_Do not deal with your adoption by tanking your father’s company. Do not deal with your CEO leaving by building a girl FRIDAY and hiring a redhead who doesn’t like you much. When your best friend dies don’t jump straight to foreign invasion and kidnapping. When you fail to protect another do not commit treason._  
  
_Do not be Tony Stark. Be someone else. Someone better. Full of restraint and mercy._  
  
“Leave, Doom. Just - leave. I have work to do.” Tony could force him. He has a number of energy fields that might at least flummox him and FRIDAY has Dr. Strange on speed dial. Tony could just dump this all in Stephen’s lap and call it a night.  
  
“No.” Doom strides forward, dark eyes critical. “You shouldn’t be wallowing.”  
  
_Great job Tony, you’re not even meeting Doctor Doom’s standards of superhero behaviour._  
  
“You’ll excuse me if I don’t trust the source of that advice.” He’s not going to rest, that much is obvious, but he has checks to run and wills to update. A million little tasks to keep his brain going until tomorrow and the adrenaline kicks in. “And I’m not wallowing, I’m working and unless you’re going to help - ”      
  
Later Tony’ll blame the sleep deprivation for the fact that he doesn’t react fast enough because Doom just grabs him by the shoulders and then there’s the telltale pressure drop of teleportation by magic. Tony barely waits until they’ve manifested before he shoves Doom away from him, hard enough to send him into what is apparently the wall of a hotel room. The Manhattan skyline is visible from the window, they haven’t gone far but that’s not the point -  
  
“I did not bring you here to fight,” Doom says, brushing imaginary lint from his waistcoat.  
  
“Take me back.” Tony is too close to the edge. He has too many dead friends and still more who’d have preferred to bury him. He can’t do a kidnapping routine with Victor. Not right now.  
  
“No.”  
  
“Just - ”    
  
“Why?” Doom says sharply as he watches him with measured calmness. “ _I_ am not a superhero, Anthony.”  
  
Something in Tony _snaps_.  
  
_Fight it is_ , he thinks with destructive glee, adrenaline and hate burning under his skin as he launches himself at Doom.  
  
“ ** _Sleep_**.” The word slams into Tony like a freight train. Instant numbness engulfs him and his last thought before unconsciousness takes him is that he’s always had a knack for picking fights he’d lose.  
  
—————  
  
When he wakes the sun is starting to sink below the horizon. The clock reads 7:04 pm which means he’s been asleep for approximately 5 hours. His body protests every move as he sits up from where he’s been dumped, fully dressed, on top of the bed covers. Almost fully dressed - his feet are bare, missing his socks and shoes in a concession to propriety. He finds them arranged at the foot of the bed, one navy sock tucked into each loafer.    
  
Beyond that there is a note on the sidetable composed of two lines: _The room is paid through tomorrow night. Stay as long as you like._ It isn’t signed.  
  
The bay window permits a breathtaking view of the city in twilight and for a moment Tony allows himself to fall in love with the stillness. The sleep must have been good for something if he can hold a thought in his head that doesn’t immediately spiral into death or Carol or destruction. It feels illicit to enjoy this, the aftereffects of being kidnapped, and more guilt from the ever-replenishing pool at Tony’s centre rushes to the surface.  
  
It’s not supposed to feel good or calming. And since Tony’s moral fibre is apparently too weak for it to be rejected by instinct, he can’t _allow_ himself to feel good. He swallows it down instead and concentrates. His emergency protocols have been activated and sure enough he can see the slight shimmer of one of his stealth armours hovering outside in the purpled sky, having tracked him automatically in the interim and now awaiting instructions that will never come from a Tower that no longer exists. A single thought would bring it through the glass and hide him from the world under nigh-indestructible alloy.  
  
Instead Tony lets it hover. (Just a couple more hours of not being himself.)  
  
Instead he takes his aching bones to stand under the hot water of the luxury shower for far longer than is advisable because he can, and because he has not always been self-aware enough to relish good things before they end.  
  
The sun has set by the time there’s an awkward fumble at the hotel room door. Tony freezes, half-dressed in his slacks and an open button-down, ready to call the armour. He watches as a black gloved hand snakes in through the crack in the door and flicks a switch. Light floods the room in a soft yellow glow, framing the most dangerous man on earth.  
  
For once Doom looks… ordinary. He’s dressed down in a black turtleneck and grey trousers with black leather gloves. He’s carrying two brown paper bags - one in his left hand, the other tucked under his left arm - and there’s a hotel key card that he’s trying to slot back into his wallet single-handedly. The spectacle is so ridiculously domestic that hysteria bubbles up from somewhere deep inside of Tony and he has to clamp his mouth shut to keep it in.  
  
_Supervillains, they’re just like us!_  
  
He’s sure he doesn’t make a sound but Doom catches sight of him almost immediately. Even in the dimly-lit room Tony can see dark eyes scanning him up and down with intent. He resists the urge to button up his shirt and hide the RT, instead settling for crossing his arms in front of his chest not that that’s particularly subtle either. All the peace he found since waking fades, leaving only the bitter aftertaste of reality.  
  
Doom resumes his motions. “Feeling better?”  
  
Tony wants to lie and say _no_ for the principle of the thing. Instead he gives a short sharp nod.  
  
Doom seems to take that admission in stride. “I did not expect you to stay.”  
  
_Neither did I_. “I don’t have anywhere else to be.”     
  
“I know.” Doom sets about methodically unpacking cartons of food from the paper bags onto the desk. “I did not believe that would be enough to keep you here.”  
  
The smell of the food reaches him from across the suite and Tony doesn’t remember the last time he ate but the greasy odour makes him nauseous and ravenous in equal measures. “Yeah, well, I never thought Dr. Doom liked Chinese takeout. Sometimes you’re just wrong.”  
  
“Would you like some?”  
  
Tony just glares from the relative safety of his half of the room. “No. I don’t want anything from you. And I really need that food to be poisoned and part one of a six-point plan to rule the world because this”, and he motions to the domesticity between them, “is not something I can deal with right now. Or possibly ever.”  
  
“I didn’t bring it for you, I was offering to share.” Doom separates the cheap bamboo chopsticks with a snap. “I tend to refrain from poisoning my own food.”  
  
Doom has definitely done a 180 if sharing is a concept he even remotely understands but as far as Tony can tell he’s not lying about this. There are only three small containers on the desk; one rice, one vegetable, with the last split between a little bit of meat and sauce. Four spring rolls are leaking grease from inside a small, damp paper bag. There’s only enough for one person and the kicker is the accompanying wine. It’s a decent bottle of red and Tony can’t even make eye contact with it.  
  
Still, it’s a relief to know he’s not so predictable that Doom knew he’d still be here. It’s an affirmation that he’s still his own man and not yet the extrapolation of all his previous mistakes. Not yet trapped by the future. That’s what he’s fighting for, isn’t it? The right to surprise the world with your fuck-ups, to gamble on the one-in-a-million chance you turn out better than your nature. The right to pretend you’ve changed.  
  
Tony maliciously steals a spring roll almost hopes the crunch of rice paper and vegetables sets off an explosive device.  
  
Doom looks amused. “You still have difficulty accepting I have your best interests at heart.”  
  
“Gee, I wonder why. All you’ve done so far is kidnap me and - ” Tony gestures quickly towards the wine, ashamed to admit it bothers him.  
  
“I never bothered to learn the protocol for these situations.” Doom clicks his fingers and the bottle disappears. The relief Tony feels at its absence outweighs even the reminder of Doom’s magic.  
  
“Of course not,” Tony says, trying and failing to keep the edge out of his voice, “nothing so lowly could ever trouble Doctor Doom.”  
  
“My destructive pursuit was never alcohol, no,” Doom says, softly and solemnly enough that Tony feels ashamed.  
  
“I’m still not eating your food,” he says, and in direct contradiction to that pronouncement proceeds to steal a second spring roll.    
  
Doom clearly doesn’t care. He gives Tony a wide berth as he sits down in the armchair. He’s still wearing his gloves which Tony would find odd if he didn’t know how quickly the body adapts to the weight of gauntlets and how naked your hands can feel without them.  
  
Tony has to say something before Doom starts his take-out TV dinner in front of CNN because even Tony’s genius brain will not be able to deal with that image. “Where am I?”  
  
“The Ambassador Hotel. Empire Suite. You’re secure. No one’s going to search for you here.”  
  
Tony is unsure if that’s meant as a reassurance or a threat. “Why am I here?”  
  
“Because you chose to stay.” Logically. “And the reason for that is far more interesting than any explanation of why I brought you here.”  
   
“No. No, it isn’t.” Tony gears up. It feels good to pick an argument. To face off against a supervillain instead of joining him for dinner. “ _You’re_ the one who - “  
   
“Stop making excuses,” Doom interrupts. “You could be home by now. Your armour is here.” He gestures out the window to where the undetectable armour apparently isn’t undetectable enough. “I am not the one intruding.”  
  
“ _Are you kidding me?_ You’re intruding on _every aspect of my life_ and - it physically pains me to say this - I can’t figure out why.” Tony runs his hands over his face. “Why me? So you gave up your country and what, you got bored and needed a project?” He appreciates that Doom’s eyes narrow at that at least. “Why aren’t you palling around with Stephen? Or T’challa? Or _anyone_ even slightly - ” He doesn’t finish the sentence. He doesn’t know how.  
  
“Why are you leading a faction of superheroes against Colonel Danvers?” Doom counters.  
  
Tony’s jaw clenches. “Because Ulysses is wrong and it’s getting good people killed. Don’t change the subject.”    
  
“I haven’t. Why is it _you_? Why not the King, or the Sorcerer Supreme?” Doom asks calmly. “Why not the good Captain? Why did all of this fall to Anthony Edward Stark?” Tony just glares but it doesn’t stop Doom from continuing, “You’re clearly in no state to do so and yet…” He makes a hand gesture that clearly means _here we are_.  
  
“I’ve had just about enough of people telling me I’m emotionally compromised. I know I am.” In fact several people have made it quite clear he’s not the selling point of Team Don’t-Fuck-the-Future. “And I’m still _right_. But I’m not talking about the Avengers, I’m talking about you.”  
  
“I have been considerably more helpful than them.”  
  
Tony’s mechanically-driven heart nearly skips a beat. “Please tell me you didn’t kill that Inhuman kid.”  
  
“That is not the type of help I provide these days.”  
  
“What type _do_ you provide? Keep in mind I’ve already started a personal war with a sovereign nation; kidnapped, scared the shit out of, and made a digital copy of a 22-year-old’s brain. SHIELD issued an arrest warrant for me yesterday for the twin Ts: terrorism and treason, and I have decoy suits being sighted at multiple locations over the globe keeping Carol & co busy.” Tony smiles without mirth. “I’m afraid I’m already well versed in your kind of _help_.”  
  
“Imitation is the sincerest form of flattery,” Doom says and Tony absolutely doesn’t dwell on that, “but to reiterate, that is not the help I provide these days.”  
  
The answer does nothing but make Tony feel petty; like a bratty drowning kid holding out for the hot lifeguard instead of being thankful someone’s coming at all. “So what’s your price then, because the Inhumans cleaned me out for kidnapping their golden goose.”  
  
“For a man attempting to grow beyond material things, you continue to cling to the belief everything can be bought.” Tony glares because he may be an unabashed capitalist but Doom ran a goddamn kleptocracy. “I’ve always been interested in more esoteric rewards.”  
  
Tony’s lips twist. “So it’s not my money. It’s not my tech. Why don’t you drop the cryptic supervillain speak and just _tell me what you want_.”  
  
Doom looks mildly irritated that Tony is still asking this question, like he’s a particularly slow child. “I do not require anything from you.”  
  
Tony wracks his brain trying to parse that answer into a statement that isn’t just… useless. _I do not require anything from **you**_. “So… you want something from someone else. Amara?” he asks as a shot in the dark. “You’re on better terms than we are. She’s not speaking to me since I abandoned her for three months while pretending to be dead.” He grimaces.  
  
“I don’t think the lovely Dr. Perera would take kindly to you offering her.”  
  
_Because yes, let’s make the conversation about this now._  
  
Tony’s frustration boils over, caution forgotten, he just needs this to be over. “Would you prefer I offered myself instead?” He stalks over to the armchair and plants himself in Victor’s space. “Is this what you want, Doomsy?” Tony folds himself closer, as aggressive as he can get without touching. “My attention? My everlasting devotion?” He can’t help but bare his teeth as his voice slips lower. “Do you really miss Reed that much?”    
  
Doom’s eyes burn and Tony is viciously glad of getting a response. “Richards has nothing to do with this.”  
  
“I doubt that,” Tony says with an unkind laugh, “but you’re out of luck because I’m not him and I never will be. I’d say sorry to disappoint but - ”  
  
“I know who you are, Stark.”  
  
“Then why are you still here?” That’s the crux. The people who know Tony best are the people who know when to leave, when to cut him down, when to die. Doom’s still here because Doom knows nothing. “There’s nothing I have that you couldn’t take from me or make yourself. Point made. So what’s left? My endorsement? My tailor? A sexual hazing into the Superhero Club?”  
  
It makes little-to-no sense if the answer to any of those is _yes_ but Tony is rapidly running out of things a reforming supervillain of Doom’s caliber could want from him. Tony’s worth mostly lies in the realm of material things and if you take those away (if he loses them, piece by piece) he’s just a clever brain and a warm body.  
  
Doom is silent. That’s when Tony knows he’s in trouble. He’s not wearing his armour and he’s several feet too far into Doom’s personal space - leaning over the armchair, arms braced to cage a _sorcerer-tyrant_ between them and…  
  
It’s not panic but it’s a near thing; Tony’s breathing is erratic and with his shirt unbuttoned he can’t hide it. Doom on the other hand looks calm as ever, gloved hands clasped in front of him. His stare is dispassionately calculating as it travels down Tony’s naked torso and back up again. It’s the focused gaze of a scientist, meticulously cataloguing details, flaws. Trust Doom to find them all.  
  
“Beautiful.” The word hits Tony almost as hard as _sleep_ but for all the wrong reasons because Doom’s not looking at him, not really. Instead his eyes are locked on the soft glow of the RT in Tony’s chest.  
  
Tony’s tenuous control of the situation plummets to zero in the space of a single heartbeat. The muscles of his arms lock as he forces himself not to recoil. He’s not arrogant enough to think Doom had no idea of the basics of the RT’s operation but it’s one thing to assume he’s stolen a few schematics and it’s another to expose his dysfunctional heart to a man who not too long ago would have ripped it out just to see how it worked.  
  
Tony licks dry lips. “You don’t want one, trust me.”  
  
“I am capable of admiring things I do not possess.”  
  
“Normally as a prelude to stealing them and making them yours.”  
  
Doom absently begins pulling his right glove off, tugging at each of the fingertips. “Yes.”  
  
It’s all done incredibly casually which is the excuse Tony clings to as to why he doesn’t see it coming. Doom’s bare hand reaches into his open shirt and Tony’s terrified for an instant that the man is indeed going to pull his heart out. Instead a warm hand skims down the side of his ribcage to settle where his waist meets his hip. The singular sensation of skin-on-skin _burns_ and Tony can’t decide if he despises it more because it might be magic or because it might not be.  
  
His teeth clench but he stays frozen. He was an idiot to challenge Doom like this. He’d forgotten who he was dealing with. Doom’s eyes aren’t hidden by a mask but the same possessive heat they always had flickers like a candle in their depths. This would at least explain why him and not the others. Tony just has the correct alignment of sexuality, reputation and deficit of moral character the job requires.  
  
The buzzing under Tony’s skin builds but the hand on his hip doesn’t move at all and it’s the stillness of the situation that he cannot abide. It’s clearly his move and he knows what needs to happen next. He needs to back away and call the suit, let it wrap around him and protect him from himself. That’s what he needs to do.  
  
_But it feels good to feel wanted instead of tolerated, doesn’t it? That’s how you know it’s bad for you._  
  
He takes a single step backwards and Doom’s hand falls from his hip. His skin feels cooler without the touch (who’d have thought Doom would be _warm_? Who’d have thought he’d be that human?) Tony breathes in and out, and the small part of him concerned with logic and dignity screams but he suppresses it as easy as breathing. That’s to be expected these days: Tony’s Jiminy Cricket got fed up and left, and his Voice of Reason is dead.  
  
Doom isn’t his friend. Victor is wretched and untouchable and Tony owes him nothing.  
  
It feels good, not having to care.  
  
Tony slips to his knees in front of the armchair. He runs his hands over the smooth material of grey trousers and gets lost in the glide of expensive wool under his fingers, each stroke running further up the inseam. He rocks himself forward to brush his cheek against the bulge at the juncture and the texture catches on his goatee but feels marvellous against his skin. Tony has already mapped out what comes next in his head. He’s done this a dozen times and this could be any one of those vague faces he’s chased for quick relief in a coatroom or his suite. It never really mattered who they were then and it doesn’t really now. He moves to mouth him through the fabric and -  
  
A gloved hand cups Tony’s chin and forces him to look up, reality intruding on the comfortable routine he wants to lose himself in. He blinks and finds Doom looking down at him, not quite unkindly, a stony expression on his shadowed face. Tony can’t look away. The hand wouldn’t let him regardless.  
  
“Anthony.” It’s not a question but Doom waits for an answer anyway.  
  
Tony shakes his head in a poor attempt to break Doom’s vice but the grip tightens instantly, steel couched in leather, and Tony is assaulted by every memory of cruelty he’s ever seen those hands inflict.  
  
Doom’s clearly not going to let him go until he gets a satisfactory response. Tony closes his eyes and sighs, brain reluctantly coming back online. “Victor,” he says finally, hoping it’ll be enough. Doom’s eyes just glitter and Tony wills the whatever weight the use of that first name carries across the gulf between them.  
  
This time the hand does let go and Tony briefly regrets losing the touch - clothed or not. He busies himself with logistics, buttons and zippers parting easily under clever fingers. Victor’s already half-hard when Tony pulls him out and he can’t tell if it’s because Doom hasn’t gotten laid in awhile or if it’s just the image of having someone on their knees in front of him that does it. He’s uncut, which given Victor was born somewhere in Eastern Europe is probably something Tony could have deduced and is now something he will never be able to forget.  
  
Tony sucks him slowly to full hardness, eyes down and closed, zeroing in on the sensations he covets; the ridges under his tongue, the slide of foreskin around the head. The velvety, warm length hardens in his mouth, curves slightly upward, and Tony adjusts automatically, optimizing for the best angle. His left hand is curled loosely around the base, right arm braced around the muscled leg he can feel flexing and relaxing rhythmically. He never looks up.  
  
A simple task for a simple man instead of a complicated moral dilemma.  
  
Tony has no idea why he thought Doom would remain passive but his breath still catches in surprise when a polished shoe roughly nudges his left knee wider, adjusting his posture. Fingernails from Victor’s naked hand rake across his scalp before enmeshing themselves in his hair with an unconscious tug and Tony is the type of person who could only interpret that as encouragement. He lets his head fall forward and loses himself in repetition; the rhythmic slide, the careful grip and the soft material of Victor’s trousers under his skin.  
  
It feels wonderful. Not quite as good as _flight_ or _creation_ of course, but _sex_ is never that far down. (Tony doesn’t like to let himself think about how high _drunk_ used to be on that list.) There’s a reason he indulges himself often enough. Even now, the reciprocal pleasure never mattered as much as the idea of being _wanted_. It’s that feeling that means even with nothing more than Victor’s hand in his hair there’s a warm rush of blood to his groin and he’s already hard in his trousers. He’s so immersed in his own head, so completely enraptured by what _he’s_ getting out of the experience that he’s not paying that much attention to anything else. So when the hand in his hair tries to pull him off Tony doesn’t let it and the inevitable happens.  
  
Victor’s sharp intake of breath is the first sound to make it through Tony’s fog and the result is the worst of both worlds: a bitter flood of semen across his tongue instead of down his throat. He swallows wrong and chokes on it, coughing to clear his airway as it leaks out the corner of his mouth to trickle downward through his goatee. His eyes well up in an involuntary response and when a hand reaches for his shoulder to steady him Tony knocks it away more violently than is necessary for the perfunctory gesture it is.  
  
He sprawls back from the armchair, still coughing, and crawls backward, putting distance between them. He stops when he’s halfway across the too-small room because Doom hasn’t moved to follow him. Tony is unbelievably grateful for that. Except now his position maximizes the glow emanating from his chest and the hard-on in his trousers and Tony tries not to care what the rest of him looks like: ruined and disheveled and flushed; the bad kind of desperate that is Tony all over. Pathetic and undignified and -  
  
Tony shuts his eyes and tries find a single voice in the muddled noise in his head.    
  
“Stop thinking.” It’s Doom’s voice as Tony remembers it in his memories: commanding and absolute and cold.  
  
It works. Tony catches his breath and drops into the comforting blankness of frozen thought. He stares at the hotel wall and the seconds of silence stretch for hours.  
  
“Touch yourself, Anthony.” The timbre of Doom’s order is infinitely softer this time; huskier and still far enough away Tony only feels the slightest frizzle of _regretpanicfear_ before it’s quashed by the growing awareness of the pressure behind his fly. He undoes the button on his slacks and slides his hand into his underwear to grip himself, not bothering to remove either item of clothing.  
  
The blank wall he’s staring at is a shade of off-white Ecru and for all the hedonism Tony’s been accused of pure sensation has never cut it for him. He closes his eyes, tries to replay some fantasy or memory but the problem is he’s pissed off so many people lately that conjuring anyone is a full-blown guilt trip. Dark silky hair and an accented voice tells him to leave her alone forever. Blond hair and hard blues eyes look down on him without a hint of what they used to share.  
  
It’s frustration more than anything that causes him to open his eyes. Victor is still sitting in the armchair watching Tony with too keen eyes. He’s already readjusted his clothes, one ankle propped up on the opposite knee, one elbow resting on the arm of the chair. It’s the pose of a man accustomed to a throne and even without the cloak and armour it’s undoubtedly Dr. Doom, and that doesn’t slow Tony’s hand _at all_. He promises to chastise himself for it later because right now he only wants -  
  
It’s not enough to _want_ something. You’d think Tony would have learned that by now.  
  
He shuts his eyes and tries more. He imagines doing this properly: in bed and naked and with all the time in the world. He’d get to see what Victor has hidden from the world under armour and cloaks for two decades; get to taste it. And Doom clearly isn’t shy about his wants which would - which would -  
  
_They’re dead, Tony. What are you chasing?_  
  
_not enough not enough not enough not enough_  
  
“Stop.”  
  
Tony’s eyes fly open and Doom is right there beside him, crouched with one knee on the ground, bringing him closer - but not quite - down to Tony’s level.  
  
“I said _stop_.” Doom scowls in distaste and Tony realizes his hand’s been continuing it’s motions, doing nothing more than irritating his uncooperative if not insistent hard-on.  
  
Tony stops because what else is there to do? He leans back on his elbows, breathing shallowly and well aware he’s exposing every vulnerable bit of himself to Victor von Doom. Doom looks untouched, utterly unaffected by afterglow. With his head bent in the shadows Tony can’t see his eyes. Can’t read his judgement. He tries for a better look but the moment he starts Victor’s bare hand finds his hair again and tugs his head down to the carpet, keeping Doom outside his field of vision.  
  
Slowly, deliberately Doom’s gloved hand encircles Tony’s erection. It feels good, the leather lubricated by Tony’s own saliva as it slides up and down, finding a rhythm and a pressure that works. It’s not better than Tony’s own hand, it doesn’t know what he likes, but that’s part of the reason he can feel the pleasure start to build again: he doesn’t have to do anything at all. He doesn’t have to feel selfish and guilty because he’s alive to feel this and other people ( _better people_ ) aren’t. All he has to do is accept what is being given to him freely.  
  
Suddenly _not enough_ is replaced by needing _more_. Tony doesn’t know how to ask for faster, tighter, for bare skin instead of leather, so he keeps his mouth shut and lets his own hand cover glove, guiding it until Doom’s hand grabs his wrist and manoeuvres Tony’s hand around his own shaft once more. Tony reluctantly picks up his pace, grounded only by the grip of the hand in his hair and the feel of leather against his wrist.    
  
The suite’s ceiling is white stucco, half-dark and empty. It could be anywhere in the world. Tony could be anyone in the world, anywhere else. The leather touch is gone, the hand in his hair gives a sharp tug and -  
  
His orgasm isn’t so much pleasure as relief. He lets himself slump and stares at the stucco ceiling, stroking himself absently as the aftershocks run through him. He feels sated and relaxed and distant. He’s spent a decent chunk of his life in the selfish pursuit of this dulled, blank headspace where nothing hurts as much as it should. The brief respite from the physical world and all Tony can think in this perfect moment of nothing is that he doesn’t want to be here.  
  
_Here_ is this hotel room, _here_ is New York, _here_ is the present. He wants to be at home rooting through his fridge and asking Rhodey if Carol knows about his Captain America boxers and what kind of tasteful boudoir photos Tony should send her if she doesn’t. He never got around to doing that. It’s never going to happen now. It’s too late.  
  
He keeps his eyes open and locked on the ceiling because if he closes them water will spill down his cheeks and he can’t envision the horror that would be Doom’s reaction to that. The post-orgasm bliss seeps right through his bones, drains out of him until he’s hollow again. Reality flickering back into soft focus. The carpet under his back is rough and the fluid on his stomach has cooled and started to dry tacky.  
  
The hand in his hair is gone.  
  
Light from the bathroom slices through the darkened room like a shard and Tony moves leadenly towards it. He doesn’t look back. He has to squint when he steps into the blindingly white of the tiled room. The harsh lights make his skin look too pale and he averts his gaze from his reflection in practiced habit. He leans over the porcelain sink to spit but his mouth is too dry, all it does is bring the taste back up and now Tony knows exactly what the literal taste of doom is: heavy and bitter and male.  
  
There’s a shadowed figure in the open doorway but Tony doesn’t turn around. If he does he’ll do something stupid like slam the door or start a fight, or Doom might reach for him again and Tony doesn’t know what he’d do then but he suspects it wouldn’t be something a moral, upstanding superhero would do, but rather something a fucked-up, grieving Tony Stark would do. He can’t afford to be himself right now.  
  
After a moment of stillness the shadow retreats.    
  
When Tony opens his eyes again he forgets to avoid his reflection. Staring back at him is a portrait of alleyway debauchery: despite his best efforts a tear track runs from the corner of his right eye down his cheek, his hair is sticking up in whatever direction it pleases, and his facial hair is crusted. A mess, both inside and out. It’s an image infinitely closer to who he is than the clockwork perfection of the Iron Man armour and Tony can’t stand to look at it at himself for long.  
  
He runs the tap and scrubs a former God-Emperor’s semen out of his goatee and uses a washcloth to wipe his own fluids off his torso. Lukewarm water and soap only because hot water denatures the proteins and causes them to flake like dried glue off skin. There are a few streaks of something across the RT, the origin of which he doesn’t analyze too closely before cleaning it up. None of this is new to him. It’s rote. It’s fine. He’s fine.     
  
Minimal risk of transmission aside, he’ll have to get tested again because the idea of asking Dr. Doom if he’s clean is a conversation he literally cannot bring himself to have. _Risky sexual behaviour_ , yet another thing Steve can add to the list of Tony’s symptoms. It will go well with his mania, paranoia, trust issues and control issues, despite the fact that sleeping with Doom is in direct contradiction to most of those pronouncements. He hopes that’s not why he did it, but it’s not like proving Steven Rogers wrong is unknown motivation to him.  
  
He’s right back where he started: in helpless grief and burning anger, except now there’s an additional helping of self-disgust heaped on top because he’s just had sex with a brutal dictator-slash-supervillain in a vague attempt to make himself feel better and it hasn’t even worked.  
  
Amara would have expected better. There’s a very good reason they’re no longer speaking. Fuck, if Ulysses can forsee disasters why didn’t Carol and Peter break down the door and stop him? Tony’s certainly earned his way onto a profiling list somewhere and on the off-chance he hasn’t, _Victor von Doom fucking has_.  
  
_Yeah, that’s right, blame this on Carol and her crystal ball, Tony. ‘Cause otherwise this is just you, isn’t it?_  
  
He already knows this is going to come back to haunt him even if he doesn’t know how. It’s not even a patented Doomplot he’s worried about. It’s everyone else. For a moment he’s thankful Reed and Sue are gone before guilt slams into him for even thinking that. T’challa will give him that long stare that means he thinks (knows) that he shouldn’t have expected better. Steve - Steve will probably ask if he was drunk and Tony will have to decide which version will cause him to fall further in Steve Rogers’ moral standing. On the lighter side, Pepper might call - to yell at him, of course - but she might call.  
  
Someone will tell the Munchkins; Sam and Kamala and Miles, and that will hurt the most. Whatever he has with them is perfect and so, so fragile and he’s ruined it without outside help. It’s a lesson about heroes they’d have to learn eventually but Tony is loathe to be the one to teach it. He hates proving everyone right once more.  
  
All this is hypothetical of course, he can’t see the future. No one can. Not even Ulysses.  
  
All this is hypothetical because Tony is just a broken little boy in love with his toys and tomorrow he goes to war with a woman who can swallow a sun. He may not last long enough to see any of this to fruition.  
  
And this is what he’s chosen to do on his last night.  
  
Doom is back in the armchair when Tony exists the bathroom. If there existed a merciful god then Tony would have been alone or Fin Fang Foom would have attacked but no, this is much worse: Doom reading a slim book and sipping the formerly-disappeared merlot from a wine glass. Both the drink and the bottle disappear the moment Tony crosses the threshold even though Doom doesn’t look up.  
  
Tony’s as clean as he can make himself without another shower. Shirt buttoned up and tucked-in; a too-late attempt at respectable. He still feels too stripped down like this and god, Tony has always preferred the claustrophobic confines of armour to the feeling of exposure. Still this isn’t Tony’s first rodeo. He’s no stranger to one-night stands - not even ill-advised ones. He can feel Doom’s eyes on him, studying him, taking him apart and it doesn’t matter because it’s not like Tony has anything to hide anymore. He handed himself to Doom on a silver platter. He wonders what the price for that will be.  
  
He leans against the doorframe and his voice is hoarse. “Please tell me that wasn’t part of some master plan on your part because it’d make me feel cheaper than I already am.”  
  
“The proposition was yours,” Doom reminds him dryly.  
  
Tony winces and hopes the dim light saves him. “Yeah, well, it seemed like a good idea at the time.”  
  
“Most terrible ideas do.”  
  
Tony tenses because it’s one thing for _him_ to know how much of a mistake this was - “Then why did you…”  
  
“You are a hopeless empiricist, Stark. You learn best through experimentation and failure.”  
  
“Thanks,” Tony deadpans, more out of fatigue than sarcasm. “Want to fill me in on what I learned?”  
  
“Sex was not what I wanted from you.” Doom picks up his discarded glove to wriggle it on and Tony has to stop himself from staring. “Furthermore, it was not what you needed”  
  
Tony tries to swallow and finds his mouth dry. He feels unclean and used and _yes, he knows that now_. He hates that Doom is right. That sex is a simple distraction that doesn’t give him peace or certainty or absolution. It didn’t even get him any closer to figuring out what Doom wants from him.    
  
He’s still not quite sure he’s ready to regret it yet.  
  
“I won’t hold it against you,” Doom says gently and when did Tony begin to believe Doom’s voice even had that range?  
  
Tony just nods, not quite believing. Victor’s eyes flick towards his chest and Tony doesn’t flatter himself in thinking that Doom’s interested in anything other than the RT; another weakness Tony’s exposed in a fit of impulsivity that’s bound to catch up with him. The fact that Doom hasn’t used any of them against him yet is a testament to his restraint. He might make a decent superhero after all.  
  
Maybe Tony can believe in this one more impossible thing. He closes his eyes and breathes around his clockwork heart. “If you want something from me, better ask soon because I might not be around much longer to deny it to you in person.”  
  
“Tomorrow,” Doom dismisses, like he’s not deliberately dangling the truth as a reward if Tony manages to survive the clusterfuck that will be the confrontation at the Capitol.  
  
He wonders if not returning might not be the easiest way out of all this. He doesn’t want to die, he doesn’t want to lose, but he is owed both by a huge margin and he’s the type of sacrifice wars should aspire to reap - the type of person the world can do without. Because it turns out the world can live without Tony just fine in a way that he’s learned he cannot live without James Rhodes. Jim and Bruce deserved better. Miles deserves better. Most days Tony just _deserves_.  
  
He could ask Victor for help, maybe improve his odds tomorrow. Doom’s been surprisingly magnanimous so far and Tony wonders how Strange pulls off their infrequent team-ups. If the Sorcerer Supreme trades on his body too or if Stark once again surprises everyone with the depths to which he sinks.  
  
“ _Please_ ,” Tony croaks. He doesn’t know what he’s asking for. Help, or the truth; more, or less.  
  
Doom’s eyes are calculating, wary even. He slides the still-untouched styrofoam containers over before rising to his feet. “I dislike American Chinese food. It disagrees with me.”  
  
_Then it's your fault for buying it,_ Tony thinks flippantly before unease sets in. He stomach growls. _W_ _hy would Doom bring back food he hates to a hotel room?_  
  
He looks at the cartons uneasily because the answer is simple: _he wouldn’t_. Which means Doom brought them Tony - for a man he knew wouldn’t take them from him, not if he gave them outright. Which means -  
  
All at once the pieces fall together in perfect coalescence.  
  
_A check-up. A safehouse. Sleep. Sex. Food._  
  
It doesn’t feel like romance or flattery. It feels horrifically like disguised help; poorly judged and manipulatively given but help just the same.  
  
_That is not the type of help I provide these days._  
  
It’s probably a trap. _It has to be,_ Tony thinks, mildly hysterically, because if it isn’t…  
  
“Why - “ He sounds like a broken record but when he turns Victor is already gone. Another loose end Tony might never get back.  
  
He doesn’t leave, not right away. He just sits in the half-dark and eats a last supper of cold Chinese take-out in styrofoam. It tastes greasy and artificial and like a very careful kindness from a man unfamiliar with it.

**Author's Note:**

> This just needed to be off my hard drive. So here it is, barely edited: the timeline makes no sense, and I didn't actually read the end of Doom Ironman so who the hell knows what happened with that. 
> 
> But here, have some sex that ticks a bunch of boxes that aren't too prevalent in the fic circles I run in:  
> 1\. People have sex for reasons other than love.  
> 2\. Sex does not magically solve anything.  
> 3\. A lot of sex is messy; both logistically and materially.  
> 4\. You can have sex without penetration, without kissing and with most of your clothes on. It still counts.


End file.
